Overall the community of experts, practitioners, and scholars focusing on and dealing with information communication technology (ICT) and e-governance sees them as positive developments. Citizens often also see them as helpful, facilitating their interactions with public services. In this perspective, ICT and, more specifically, e-governance, i.e. the use of ICT to assist the administration of public services and, in connection with it, governance and government practices at the local, national, regional and international levels, are viewed as contributing to the greater effectiveness, transparency, and credibility of public administration, governance and government functions. 1 Against this background, this brief article does not mean to deny the virtues of ICT and e-governance. It is indeed difficult not to see the benefits brought by ICT applied to government and governance operations and services. Still, offering a bit of a contrarian view, it draws out some of the limitations or downsides of ICT in the context of government/governance. As such, it touches upon three main points.First, it challenges the assumption that ICT applied to public administration, governance and government is always and by definition improving their functions. For the positive aspects of e-governance are not all there is to it. There are also problematic if not negative aspects to egovernance.Second, the article refers to the paradoxical situation of ICT and e-governance today. On the one hand, they aim at improving the effectiveness, transparency, and credibility of public administration, governance and, by extension, government institutions and actors and their actions and policies at the local, national, regional and international levels. On the other hand, they are developing at a time when the public sector institutions and actors and their actions and policies are increasingly weakened and devalued, at the national, regional and international levels. This is especially the case due to the increasing role of transnational forces and the fact that these are not necessarily in line with and committed to the idea of the public good.Third, as a way to conclude, the article alludes to the need to better dovetail ICT and e-governance with the traditional functions and responsibilities of public institutions and actors toward the public good.
Tempering the ICT and e-governance optimismThere is no doubt that in the past 20 years or so ICT has profoundly transformed, and transformed positively, relations and activities within and among societies. In the process, it has also changed in positive ways, and continues to change positively the interactions between public administration, governance, and government institutions and actors and the citizens. In this regard, e-governance is officially conceived of and pursued as a way to facilitate and, ultimately, improve the ability of public actors and institutions to administer and deliver better services to societies and their members. And indeed, the author of this article is old enough to re...